In one of life's "opportunities of exploration," the strap of one of my crocs broke the same week that my packet of Sugru arrived. I've been hearing enough about this new product that I went ahead and ordered some as soon as the latest batch rolled off the production line, even though I didn't have any immediate ideas of what I'd be doing with it. I had no idea if it would be adherent or strong enough for the task, but it was a good excuse to break open a pack and try it out.

Firstly, you can get it in several colors. Not knowing what I'd be using it for, I'd order the variety pack. It wasn't obvious when I openned the bag until I noticed the little colored dot on each label showing me the color of the contents. I picked one out that looked close and cut open the bag. Can't really imagine it matching much better.

It's consistency is similar to Silly Putty, which probably shouldn't be too surprising since they're at least distantly related chemically. Bringing the two ends together was a piece of cake. The only challenge was coming up with a way of holding them together while the Sugru set. I opted for clamping.

The original packaging protected me from irreversibly bonding two pieces of scrap plastic to my shoe. Here's the result.

In retrospect, I could have done a better job of matching the contours of the strap, but hey, it's a shoe. Besides, it almost disappears unless you know it's there and you're looking for it. It was only after the project that I realized that I should probably have stitched the two ends together, then just used the Sugru of cosmetic purposes. That has turned out to be a needless worry. I've had the repair a month now with no signs of separation. The net result was that a $2 packet saved me from having to buy another pair of shoes. I'd call that a win.